London Monitor | London’s employment set to rise this year

Continued strength in the latest labour market data has led us to strengthen our London employment forecast. We now expect workplace based employment to rise by 0.2% in 2021 (up from a 0.2% decline in our
previous forecast). Labour Force Survey data show a 0.5 percentage point
increase in London’s resident employment rate to 74.9% in May July 2021. 

What you will learn:

• London’s unemployment rate continued to fall, down 0.8 points between February April and May July 2021, a sharper decline than seen nationally.
• While the Purchasing Managers’ Index for London reported a record high rate of jobs growth in August, it also showed a slowdown in growth in business activity.
• We expect that the 0.6% drop in PAYE median monthly pay reported in August is related to the increase of low wage jobs.